


oh klahoma

by xahnadu



Series: a drifter’s gambit [1]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Grieving, Mild Sexual Content, Trust Issues, cayde is mentioned multiple times, guardian is experiencing sad boi hours
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 09:42:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18233192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xahnadu/pseuds/xahnadu
Summary: Yet the weight of Cayde's death still hung around her shoulders like an albatross. So she busied herself.She reclaimed the Forges of the Black Armory. She restored Spades to its rightful glory. She threw herself into the Crucible, even surprising Shaxx with her rage on the battlefield.Most notable, however, was the amount of time she spent in Gambit.And with more time spent in Gambit, the more she saw the Drifter.





	oh klahoma

**Author's Note:**

> hello its currently (squints) 3:45AM and i finished writing this so lets get some notes out of the way
> 
> -this fic is NOT VERY ANGSTY just guardian dealing w/ cayde's death  
> -i tried to stick to the canon as closely as possible! i might have gotten things mixed up or i left something/dialogue out to make it fit the fic better  
> -it's implied that guardian had a romantic relationship with cayde  
> -guardian does NOT have a name in this fic, only referred to as she/her so feel free to insert your guardian!  
> -i listened to oh klahoma by jack stauber while writing, i think it fits this couple very well!

When she first met the Drifter, she had found herself at a crossroads.

Cayde had died. And with his death, she was forced to choose between obeying the will of the Vanguard or avenging her fallen partner. She grew angry with Zavala for not supporting the hunt for Uldren Sov, she grew angry with Ikora for not doing something to persuade Zavala, and most of all, she was angry with herself for not protecting Cayde.

She had let her closest friend die at the hands of a corrupted prince; she had let the person she had grown to love suffer and die in her arms.

She tried not to let it weigh on her shoulders. The figures of the City told her the same thing: it wasn’t her fault. She needed to move on; that’s what Cayde would want. She felt so tired, so sluggish; she could barely find the motivation to do even a simple patrol.

But when she eventually went to the Drifter to talk of the upkeep of Malfeasance, he had mentioned Cayde’s death to her. It was the same old sentence, “Don’t let his death weigh on you.” 

But he continued. 

“Somewhere out there, someone’s got a bullet with your name on it. Same for him. Same for me. Nothin’ we can do. So go out on your terms,” he had said.

Now that she thinks about it, she was sure that his words were the ones that set her plan in stone. Even if she died trying to avenge Cayde, she would make sure it was on her own terms. 

And she definitely wouldn’t let Uldren have the satisfaction of having the last word. 

That’s what Cayde would want.

So she faced Zavala and walked backwards into the hell known as the Tangled Shore. And when she came back, it was with the Ace of Spades and plenty of new scars.

Yet the weight still hung around her shoulders like an albatross. 

So she busied herself. 

She reclaimed the Forges of the Black Armory. She restored Spades to its rightful glory. She threw herself into the Crucible, even surprising Shaxx with her rage on the battlefield.

Most notable, however, was the amount of time she spent in Gambit. 

And with more time spent in Gambit, the more she saw the Drifter. 

He represented everything that Zavala didn’t. Guardians fighting Guardians for the hell of it, playing directly with the Darkness, putting others in danger because damn, it made good money and it felt pretty damn good to win. The Drifter was casual and cunning. Despite his friendly disposition, she knew better than to trust him fully. It was obvious that he had an agenda, and most Guardians who interacted with him knew it. 

They just chose to overlook it.

She didn’t. But she found herself in the Annex more and more often, whether or not she had participated in Gambit recently. Maybe because she was interested in what the Drifter had to say, or maybe because she knew it would piss Zavala off to see the famed Hero of the Red War become one of the Drifter’s “Dredgens.” 

Despite knowing that he had ulterior motives, she was curious. She was curious about what stories and secrets swam inside of the Drifter. He has been around since the Dark Age, after all. He has lived much more than she, who only remembers up until she woke at the Cosmodrome. 

They became tentative friends. Sometimes they drank together, sometimes they sat in the Annex, just the two of them, and told each other stories from past fireteams. 

Whenever the Drifter’s past was brought up by her, he always found a way to circumvent the questions and quickly change the topic. But he noticed her narrowed eyes, her lips that were pressed into a thin line somewhere between contempt and mild disappointment. 

Her interest was piqued when she had received multiple encrypted messages from a Warlock of the Praxic Order named Aunor. 

Aunor had not been wrong when addressing the Drifter in her messages to the Young Wolf. He was facilitating the darker desires of the Guardians who called the City “home” and was using those desires to benefit himself. Even if it meant the deaths of those Guardians. 

Aunor spoke of his supposed allegiance with the Shadows of Yor, how the Drifter could be yet another Yor fanatic trying to spread the glamours of the Darkness to young Guardians. 

But what struck her the most was the idea that he was trying to build a Throne World off of the death of Cayde. 

She had experienced the Reckoning, the chaos of Gambit and Gambit Prime. She ignored the satisfaction they had brought her. She wanted to know what the Drifter was pulling at. Was he going to be yet another name on her list? Was he going to be another target to kill in order to prevent another Dark Age?

Deep inside of her, she wasn’t sure if she could really kill him if it came down to it. The Drifter was one of the few who were able to assuage her grief over her partner, and whether she liked it or not, she had grown attached to him. She saw Cayde in his eccentric personality, and in his wild ideas, and “anecdotes” about eating aliens.

After sharing a curt conversation with her Ghost, she confronted the Drifter, who greeted her as usual, wearing that smug grin on his bearded face.

His smile dropped when he saw her expression: one of cold, unforgiving steel. 

She wore her masks well. So well that not even he could see the nervousness that swam just underneath her skin. 

When she confronted him about Aunor’s messages, he was just as cryptic as ever, which only made her angry with him. He seceded that he didn’t quite trust her, especially with this new information of Aunor’s investigation coming to light. He also admitted that she probably didn’t trust him fully.

So he gave her a choice. Side with Aunor and the Vanguard and lead an inquisition on him, or side with him, and you’ll learn his side of the story. 

He had watched her with a cautious gaze as she debated with herself over her decision. 

She knew that her honor dictated that she sides with the Vanguard, that she couldn’t trust everything (or anything, even) that came from the Drifter’s mouth.

But the Vanguard was a mess without Cayde. Zavala and Ikora never saw eye to eye anymore, and have kept too many secrets and have stayed far too reserved in times of crisis. 

She also knew that the Drifter wasn’t anything like the Vanguard. 

So, despite her better senses telling her otherwise, she took the snake pendant from the Drifter, who looked pleased.

If she wasn’t mistaken, she would also say that he almost looked relieved.

**

In true Drifter fashion, he sent her on a wild goose chase, which included an extravagantly expensive piece of “jerky” that nearly wiped her account out. She may be the Hero of the Red War, but she still had to earn a living. She almost shed a tear as she transmatted the Glimmer to Spider.

He led her through ravaged battlefields and to angry Cabal and Vex figureheads, whom she promptly departed from the living. 

And it was only after weeks of trusting the Drifter and completing tasks for him did he finally allow her to listen to the tapes.

She slowly but surely recovered all of them, his attempts at earning her trust.

And as she slowly uncovered the story of the Drifter, or at least the most superficial parts, she found herself believing him. The awkward fashion of the recorded tapes showed an earnest side of him that she wasn’t familiar with.

For the first time in the year and a half she has known the Drifter, she finally felt as if she was meeting him for the first time. 

After turning off the last tape, she departed the EDZ for the Annex.

**

Their reunion had been tense. And awkward.

And the relief on the Drifter’s face was as clear as day.

But they both felt as if they had a better understanding of each other; the tentative trust that they had once had was restored and strengthened. He told her that now that she has allied herself with him, she has made herself many enemies, including the Hunter with the Golden Gun. But he thought of her as his friend now, probably the only one that really counted. He told her that he had her back, that they were a team now. 

She wanted to have his back, too. And, when the time came, for the Drifter to leave the City and Solar System, she might just go with him. Because she was a woman of her own worth; she knew what she was, what she has done, and she was willing to save everyone again. But she wanted to do it on her own terms, not restricted by Zavala anymore. What she did with her future was her own decision. And that everything that went poorly or ended in death was not her fault.

And it felt good to know that.

The pain and guilt of Cayde’s death was slowly ebbing away.

**

They spent more time together after that, even more than before.

She helped him with Gambit, helped scheme up new ideas. They went out on ventures together, wiping out strikes and decimating any pretty ideas that the enemies of Humanity were getting into their thick skulls.

Sometimes their ventures went beyond than just what a fireteam would do out in the field. 

They did the same old same old: drinking, going out to eat. Only there was more honesty this time.

Enough drinks would go down and the Drifter would recount some tales from his past, although they weren’t nearly as lighthearted as the others.

She found herself listening to him recount a story of him and his crew on a dark, desolate, cold planet, where they would keel over and die from the cold or starvation. Some of the Risen had even been lost forever due to the presence of Darkness on the planet. He told her of how he had been resurrected countless times, to the point where so much time had passed that his ship had stopped working and that insanity had gripped his mind.

He also told her of how he had killed the last three members of his crew when they drew their guns on each other. He failed to tell her how he escaped, as he trailed off, clearly lost in the memory.

She had nudged his shin with her boot and suggested that they get wasted, so they did just that. 

Eventually the Drifter passed out from the booze settling in his system, and she lugged him to his bed and set his body on top of the comforter.

As she was turning to leave, her eyes caught on him. She stood there and watched him breathe, studied the relaxed, unguarded expression of the infamous Drifter. Through her hazy excuse for consciousness, she had thought to herself: “This is a different man.” 

He was changing. For her. 

And as she stumbled out of the Annex, there was a warmth in her chest that she couldn’t decide on whether it was the alcohol causing it or the Drifter’s honesty.

It felt overwhelmingly bittersweet.

And she realized the next morning, as she was brushing her teeth, that she hadn’t felt that feeling since she had first started working with Cayde.

She felt fear in that moment. She wasn’t sure what for.

**

When she received the vision from the Emissary, she was once again curious about the Drifter’s dealings, this time specifically with the Nine. “Dredgen,” they had called him.

Unlike last time, she kept her cool. She trusted the Drifter; he would explain.

She was taken aback by his reaction. He was angry, angry that they had dragged her into this, that they had shown her things she wouldn’t understand and let her believe in their delusions of grandeur that would one day turn to ashes in her mouth. 

He had told her, “The Nine aren’t to be trusted. I bit off more than I could chew, but you— you don’t deserve to be harrassed by them. Let me deal with this, and keep your distance.”

She reminded him sternly that they were a team— they had each other’s backs, remember?

The Drifter looked shocked for a split second, as if he hadn’t expected her to so rigidly assert herself to cover his back in the face of something as mysterious and powerful as the Nine.  
He broke out into a grin. Not the smug, sly one he used for the Guardians who visited him for bounties and Gambit gear, but the one that was reserved for her. A genuine, warm grin that made her chest tighten. 

And she didn’t know it, but his did too.

**

And life went on. Drinks, stories, adventures, and some pretty damn good times.

Over the next few months after the incident with the Nine, they grew closer. Close enough that it was starting to get tense again. She had a feeling she knew why.

She didn’t know if she could possibly go through this again, after Cayde. His death was nearly two years in the past, but the pain associated with the idea of losing the person she cared for was absolutely devastating, and it would always be.

The Drifter was very competent, but so had been Cayde. She knew she couldn’t protect him, she couldn’t hover over him like a mother hen. That’s not who she was, and the Drifter didn’t deserve to be burdened with her overreaching.

So when they were cornered in a Lost Sector together, Fallen bearing down on them, she watched as a Captain drew up from behind her distracted companion and prepared to snatch him from her side. And as she pushed him down and sent shotgun shells into the Fallen’s face, she realized that while she couldn’t always protect the Drifter, whether from their enemies or from the fallout from his “deals,” she would give her all into making sure that she did her best to see him happy, without pain. Because while Risen aren’t guaranteed immortality, they can make the best of the centuries they may get. They were both privileged and cursed to have such a long time in the cosmos, and she has experienced both sides.

And the Drifter had stared up at her as she covered his back, his dark brows furrowed, creating an indescribable expression on his face. 

They fought their way out of the corner and eventually got to the end of the Sector, out of breath, both covered in grime and bits of Fallen. And as he opened up the box at the far corner of the room, she caught his wrist and tugged her to him. 

His dark eyes lit up in tensed surprise as she glared up at him. He was about to ask what her deal was when she had removed her helmet, grabbed his collar, and pressed her lips to his.  
The Drifter had been tense at first, but relaxed with a long exhale through his nose, bringing his arms up to thread his fingers through her hair.

And, as they had boarded the jumpship to head back to the City, she thought to herself: she would never forget Cayde and what he taught her. She would always love him. But it was truly time to move on, and she would happily carry his memory and lessons with her until the end.

The Ace of Spades in her holster felt less heavy after that.

**

Her and the Drifter’s “illicit” relationship was a secret that was as well kept as Gambit. Meaning that everyone knew, and gossip in the City spread faster than a Thrall’s guts on a wall after meeting a shotgun point-blank.

Some people whispered about what this would mean for the Young Wolf and her relationship with the Vanguard and Aunor. That didn’t bother her. Zavala didn’t mention it, but she could see the disapproval in his piercing gaze. Ikora was wary, but she was friendly, as always. Aunor, well… Hah.

Other rumors were not as forgiving, but she didn’t really care. 

Months went by in a blur. Probably the best time she has experienced in recent memory.

The Drifter found someone in the Young Wolf that he hadn’t found in a few centuries: someone he could trust. Completely. And it went both ways.

She showed him through her patience and support in matters both on the battlefield and off, as well as her own honesty with him.

He showed her through his own honesty and providing someone to confide in for her, someone she could always come to when everything was inevitably going to shit. 

Because he knew that she was the City’s Hero, that they would inevitably ask her to save them again at the risk of her own life. And the Drifter knew that she would make her own choice, and that he would let her do it. He just wanted her to come back safely so they would both reach the day when it was time to leave.

They had both been through hell and back multiple times, and they found comfort in each other.

And they both showed their gratitude for each other in more intimate moments, where mouths were slotted into each other in the Drifter’s bedroom. They showed gratitude through the sweat that clung to their skin, the whispering of each other’s names, the small, meaningless promises, the creak of the shitty mattress beneath them as they swayed into oblivion. 

And after, she had laid in his arms, counting the scars on his chest for what seemed like the millionth time (she never got bored of it), she finally felt at peace for the first time in a long time. 

She felt finally willing to accept whatever may come next.

**Author's Note:**

> feel free to roast me in the comments
> 
> my tumblr is redocyon.tumblr.com if you wanna hmu!


End file.
